Why MYSTERIES? Because that is the genre I read. Why PARADISE? Because that is where I live.
Among other things, this blog, the result of a 2008 New Year's resolution, will act as a record of books that I've read, and random thoughts.

4 February 2017

Review: SIGNAL LOSS, Garry Disher

A
small bushfire, but nasty enough for ice cooks to abandon their lab.
Fatal, too. But when the bodies in the burnt-out Mercedes prove to be a
pair of Sydney hitmen, Inspector Hal Challis’s inquiries into a local
ice epidemic take a darker turn. Meanwhile, Ellen Destry, head of the
new sex crimes unit, finds herself not only juggling the personalities
of her team but hunting a serial rapist who leaves no evidence behind.

The
seventh instalment in Garry Disher’s celebrated Peninsula Crimes series
sets up new challenges, both professional and personal, for Challis and
Destry. And Disher delivers with all the suspense and human complexity
for which readers love him.

Garry Disher has published
almost fifty titles—fiction, children’s books, anthologies, textbooks,
the Wyatt thrillers and the Peninsula Crimes series. He has won numerous
awards, including the German Crime Prize (twice) and two Ned Kelly Best
Crime novel awards, for Chain of Evidence (2007) and Wyatt (2010). Garry lives on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula.

My Take

An impressive police procedural in an Australian rural setting, the Mornington Peninsula, depicting Victoria Police facing modern issues that are facing police the world over: the impact of ice on local communities, sex crimes, theft, and gangs. The plot strands are woven together with human interest stories, and keep the reader connected to the very end.

Within, the Victoria Police faces other issues too: an aging police force, the importance of technology, the use of DNA, competition between various police departments for the "final kill", and the possibility of burn out when the job takes on a 24/7 aspect. Disher presents well the aspects of modern life that confront ordinary civilians.